


Fix the Future

by arcadianpetriedish



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Case File, Cliffhanger Resolved, End of the World, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Love, MSR, My Own Season 11, Mytharc, Post-Episode: s10e06 My Struggle II, The Future is Controlled, The Presence - Freeform, This is gonna get wild, Time Travel, Year Zero
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-25
Updated: 2016-11-04
Packaged: 2018-08-10 22:04:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7862875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcadianpetriedish/pseuds/arcadianpetriedish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Scully's eyes widened in surprise as she saw what appeared to be a hand, reaching towards her.  Her last coherent thought was that it looked like the hand of God.<br/>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>Fox Mulder always knew that one day, Dana Scully would save the world.<br/>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In This Twilight

_“And the sky is filled with light! Can you see it?  All the black is really white, if you believe it.”  
Nine Inch Nails – “In This Twilight”_

 

  Dana Scully stood in the middle of the chaotic 14th Street Bridge in Washington D.C.  People everywhere were dying or nearing death.  People she knew.  Her partner, her best friend, Fox Mulder, sat in the passenger side of an FBI-issue fleet sedan.  One of the newer Special Agents, Kyd Miller, spent the day making a seven-hour round trip to retrieve Mulder from Spartanburg, South Carolina.  Agent Miller was also sick, but Mulder was clearly dying.  Agent Scully, a medical doctor, was there to save him.  She had the vaccine for what some would call the Spartan Virus in the IV bag she had in her tightly clenched hand.  It wasn’t going to be enough.  Scully’s mind was racing.  She pulled Agent Miller to the side of the car, just out of Mulder’s earshot.

  “He’s worse than I thought,” she whispered.

  Agent Miller’s weary, bloodshot eyes reflected concern.  He was a fighter until the end.

  “Can I do anything for him,” he asked, ready for whatever the answer may be.

  Scully’s brow knit in frustration and fear.  “What I can do might not help,” she admitted, then paused.  “He needs stem cells.  Right now.”  

  Agent Miller was confused.  “Stem cells?  From who,” he wondered out loud.

  Scully paused for a brief moment, debating whether or not to tell the new agent the truth.  She flatly said, “We have a child together.  That child will be protected by his inheritance of my alien DNA.”

  _Agent Einstein was right.  They ARE together_ , thought Agent Miller.  There was no hesitation in his voice when he pledged to Scully, “Then we have to get to him.”

  Scully could hug Agent Miller for his willingness to help her without question.  She looked him in the eye and uttered the sentence that forever branded her a deserter and a horrible mother; tried, convicted, and sentenced in the harsh, unforgiving courtroom of her mind.

  “I don’t know where he is.”

  Agent Miller saw the pain in Agent Scully’s eyes.  It was clear that she wanted, _desperately_ , to find her son.  He looked at her, trying to figure out a way to help her, when realistically, it would be nearly impossible to find anyone they knew in this mess.  He could not have known that Scully meant she had no idea of the whereabouts of her son since 2002.

  Miller’s train of thought was interrupted by a flash of extremely bright white light.  He and Agent Scully immediately looked up towards the source.

  Fox Mulder also saw the light.  He knew those lights.  He’d spent more than half his life chasing them.  They’d already killed him once; were they going to do it again, right here on this gridlocked bridge?

  A large black craft loomed on the horizon.  It lowered itself down, coming to a halt, not over Mulder’s car, but where Miller and Scully stood.  A bluish beam emitted from the bottom of the craft, shining a spotlight on Miller and Scully.  A darker, individual blue beam appeared as the craft lowered closer to the bridge.  This new beam was pointed directly at Scully.

  Mulder watched it, helpless.  He was too weak to even get out of the car, let alone rush to save the only person he’d ever truly loved.  He silently pleaded with the light.  Bargained.

  _Take me instead,_ Mulder silently begged.

  Scully saw none of this.  She stared into the beam, unafraid; almost in awe.  Her eyes widened in surprise as she saw what appeared to be a hand, reaching towards her.  Not a human hand, not an alien hand.  It was massive.

  Scully’s last coherent thought was that it looked like the hand of God.

  Mulder saw it, too.  He summoned the very last of his strength, filled his lungs with air, and yelled, “SCULLLAAAAAYYYY!!!”

  This was enough to snap Agent Miller back into action.  He shot a look at Mulder, completely spent and sunken further into the doorframe of the car.  He then looked at the ground next to him where Agent Scully had crumpled after seeing The Presence above her.  He did the only thing he could: he dropped down onto to her, covering her body with his own, and rolled her out of the direct path of the blue beam.

  The Hand immediately retracted back into the craft.  The air was heavy.  There was a moment of silence, and then…

  The screaming.  Chaos ensued all around them as people tried to make sense of what they’d just witnessed.  Thirty seconds later, total silence.  It was like nothing happened, other than the gridlock on the bridge.  Had they looked at their watches, they might have noticed that they’d all stopped several minutes prior. 

  Mulder winced as he drooped into the car door.  Why was he still alive?  What just happened?  Where was Scully?!

  She was still unconscious, lying by the rear tire of Agent Miller’s car.  He was lying next to her, amazed that his cell phone was still working.  He dialed 911 and could have kissed the lady who answered.

  “My name is Special Agent Kyd Miller with the FBI.  There are two FBI agents down and we need immediate medical attention.  One of the agents is Dr. Dana Scully.  She has in her possession a vaccine for the virus that is making everyone sick.  We need a MedFlight to the middle of the 14th Street Bridge immediately!”

   He disconnected the call, feeling a huge sense of relief.  The flight was coming.  Agent Miller hoped it arrived quickly.  He really hoped Agent Mulder could hold on for just a little bit longer.  They would get through this.

  He rolled over and looked for any trace of the blinding white like that had hovered there, just minutes before.  Other than some dark clouds in the sky, there was nothing.

  Through the distance, he heard an approaching chopper.

 

\---  
  


  Dana Scully had been wrong about science.  Twice.  In one day.  That had to be some sort of record.  The motion of the air and the sound of the MedFlight roused her from the unconscious state she’d been in since she witnessed The Presence.  She looked around and surveyed her surroundings.  She was crammed in close quarters between Agents Miller and Mulder, each of whom had IV bags dripping the Spartan Virus vaccine into their veins.

  Mulder was very still, but appeared to be alive.  Alive!

  “Welcome back, Agent Scully,” Miller greeted her weakly.

  “Agent Miller,” she said warmly.  “How are you doing?”

  “I think I’m gonna make it,” he smiled.  “Thanks to you.”

  “Mulder?”  Her voice dropped to a whisper, “Is he…?”

  She couldn’t finish the question.

   “They think he’s going to make it,” he assured her.  “Had we waited any longer…”  He trailed off.

  “Oh, thank God,” Scully exhaled, relieved.

  One of the two doctors who had quietly been in the cabin spoke up.  “Actually, for someone who was in such poor condition as Mr. Mulder, I am astounded with the rate at which he is recovering.”

  Scully’s eyes widened.  Of course!  She kicked herself for not starting his IV sooner.  The memories of how rapidly he recovered after his body was exhumed flooded back into her head.  How could she have forgotten that he is able to rebound from most anything very quickly?  She looked over at Mulder, still, but resting peacefully.  The dark circles under his eyes were already beginning to fade.  She suddenly flashed back to that horrific moment in the woods when Agent Doggett tried to hold her back from seeing Mulder’s dead body, after the aliens deposited him there, like so much garbage.  She’d been too late to save him.  Hot tears suddenly pricked behind her eyes.  She’d been granted a second chance, when Skinner and Doggett rescued him from his grave.  She stared at the man who had quite literally gone to the ends of the earth for her.

  …And she’d left him.  Packed her things, told him she couldn’t do it anymore, and left.  That was more than four years ago.  Four years of pretending that she was just fine without him.  She was always just fine, even when she wasn’t.  She wished she could travel four years back in time and ask herself what the hell she was thinking.

  Scully’s eyes slowly took inventory of Fox Mulder’s features.  She wanted to kiss the newly-applied bandage over his left eye.  She wanted to curl up on him and bury her face in his chest, just like she’d always done before.  He looked a little older now; she imagined that he’d had a rough four years.  She never once doubted that he still loved her; she knew that like she knew her name.  What she’d forgotten, and what she’d been slowly realizing over the past six weeks, was that her raw _need_ for him was just as alive as it ever was.  She could never imagine loving anyone else with the sheer ferocity of the feelings she still had for him.

  She reached over and gently took his hand in hers, intertwining their fingers.  She softly squeezed his hand and felt Mulder’s fingers gently tighten against hers.  A small corner of his mouth turned up in a half-smile.

  Agent Miller quietly watched the storm of emotions play across Agent Scully’s face as she watched Agent Mulder sleep.  _Those two have a_ very _powerful connection,_ he thought.  He hoped that one day he’d be able to find a love as strong as theirs.

  The MedFlight chopper continued slicing through the dark on its way back to Our Lady of Sorrows Hospital.

 

\---

_beep-beep…beep-beep…beep-beep_

  Fox Mulder awoke to the very familiar sight of a hospital ceiling.  _Hospitals should get with the times and start a loyalty program like hotels,_ he thought.  _Stay ten times and your next emergency is free!_   He smiled weakly at his own joke.

  A sight almost as familiar as the hospital ceiling was directly to his right.  Scully, asleep in a chair pushed up to his bedside.  Her arm balanced on the armrest, outstretched, her fingers lightly grazing his.  She looked completely exhausted.  Her hair was rumpled, her suit was dirty, and her mouth was slightly hanging ajar, but he’d never seen anything more beautiful. 

  She wasn’t even his anymore, not for the last four years, but he couldn’t remember a time when she hadn’t kept a bedside vigil for him.  His pulse quickened as he regarded her, and the traitorous beeping of his heart monitor gave his feelings away.  He was glad she slept through and missed it.  He had to be careful.  He’d felt her growing closer to him over the past six weeks, and he absolutely welcomed it.  They’d had some fun times since they’d returned to the FBI.  She’d even referred to him as “her Mulder” at that odd motor lodge with the animal heads.  He just didn’t want them to jump back and land right where they’d been for the past few years… Apart.

  He thought of the night Scully lost her mother.  He’d always liked Maggie; aside from her daughter, she was the first family member to truly welcome him.  She’d always treated him like a son.  She told him once that she knew how dangerous their jobs were, but it gave her some peace of mind knowing Dana was with him, because she knew without question he’d look out for her and do anything to protect her.  She trusted him with her daughter, a responsibility Mulder never took lightly.  He hoped that in some way, Maggie had been proud of him.

  It was just like Scully to return to work immediately after her mother’s passing.  He’d made clear to her, upon their return to Philadelphia, that he’d give her space if she needed it, but he’d be there if she needed him.  Once they wrapped the case, they had the night free in Philadelphia.  Mulder made no plans, assuming Scully would finally have some space to herself to grieve.

  He heard the soft rapping on his hotel door at 10pm.  He was already lying in bed, watching TV in his boxers, unwinding from the events of the day.  His heart hurt for Scully.  This was one type of pain he could not shield her from experiencing.  He was a distraught mess when he lost his mother; he could not have continued without Scully.  She was so stoic.  So strong.  Those were the thoughts in his head as he shrugged on a robe and went to answer the door.

  His heart broke a thousand times over once it was opened.  Scully stood there, staring at her shoes.  Her shoulders were slumped, and when she glanced up to meet his eyes, he saw that hers were red-rimmed and bloodshot from crying.  Without a word, he stepped forward and enveloped her in a tight embrace.  Her arms circled his waist as she sniffled into the shoulder of his robe.  He placed a delicate kiss on the top of her head and kept it there, softly swaying with her.

  Mulder led Scully into his hotel room; she followed as if on autopilot.  He led her to the bed and gently pushed on her shoulders so she’d sit.  He sat next to her and alternated between rubbing and patting her back.  She looked so lost, so small.  Maggie was always a huge part of Scully’s life.  He could tell that it bothered her that Maggie’s last words were to him, about William.  He knew that must have been particularly brutal to her.

  Mulder remained silent.  He knew she would talk when she was ready.  They sat on the edge of the bed for some time, in familiar silence.  Her breathing would occasionally get heavier, like she was fighting off another round of tears.  Mulder looked at her and sighed.  How much loss could one person go through?  Overwhelmed with tenderness, he took hold of her hand and squeezed. 

  Scully returned the gesture and closed her eyes, her fingers intertwined with Mulder’s.  She hadn’t realized just how badly she needed him until he called her at the hospital to let her know he was there.  It stung that her mother’s final words were not to her, but to Mulder.  She mentioned William; the one loss from which she’d never been able to heal.  It was a lot to process at once, and after she’d returned to the hotel, she stepped into a scalding hot shower as she finally allowed herself to grieve.  Transfixed, she watched as her salty tears combined with the shower suds circling the drain.  She stayed in the shower, shaking and sobbing until she was pruny and remaining there no longer served a purpose.  She couldn’t bear to be alone, so she stepped into her silky pajama set and left her room for the one place she knew she’d find solace.  Mulder’s.

  Mulder and Scully had always been able to communicate without words for the better part of two decades.  They quietly sat on the bed.  Scully added just a touch more pressure to her grip on Mulder’s hand, and he instinctively scooted closer to her until their thighs touched.  She exhaled and leaned her head over onto his shoulder.  He responded in kind.  Stubborn as they both were, they _missed_ this.  Scully raised their joined hands and contemplated them before bringing them up to her lips, where she lightly placed a kiss on Mulder’s knuckles.

  “Thank you for being there,” she whispered in a tiny, almost inaudible voice.

  “Always,” he replied as a soft exhale. 

  She gazed up at him as he looked down at her eyes, both sets radiating love.  Scully knit her brow as she searched his face.  Her eyelids lowered halfway and Mulder felt intoxicated by her drowsy stare.

  “Scuh—“, he began softly.

  She softly shushed him, punctuating her request with her lips against his.

  Mulder had dreamed of kissing Scully again ever since she left, but these were not the circumstances he’d imagined.  He was very, very gentle with her as he chastely returned the kiss. 

  The kiss broke and Scully sighed against him, tears welling in her bright blue eyes.  She looked like she had something important to say.

  Mulder’s face was still close.  “What is it,” he whispered.  She commanded his full attention.

  “This is nice,” she began.  “I missed this, Mulder.  I miss _you_.  I didn’t realize how much until we returned to the FBI.  Everything just feels like I’m where I’m supposed to be.

  “And you,” she continued, “I know I’ve been sort of cold to you once I left.  I kept some distance between us.  I _had_ to; you’re my weakness.  You always have been.”

  “Scully, it’s okay.  You don’t have to do this,” Mulder began before Scully shook her head to indicate that she had more to say.

  “Life is so fragile.  After I moved out of our house, I spent so much time with my mom.  When I wasn’t at the hospital, our relationship changed.  She and I actually became more than just mother and daughter – we became really good friends.  I wasn’t ready to lose my friend.  My mom.”

  Her voice started to waver.  She took a deep breath to steady it.

  “You know, she really loved you, Mulder.  You were like another son to her.  She asked about you all the time and seemed disappointed when I didn’t know.  You made a huge impact on her life.  She’d tell me that she trusted you absolutely and she knew I’d be safe when I was with you.”

  Mulder’s eyes were watery as he tried to process everything Scully said.  He adored Maggie but had no idea how strongly she felt about him. 

  “She was a wonderful woman, Scully,” Mulder said softly.  “I see a lot of her in you.”

  Scully gave Mulder a sad smile.  He put an arm around her shoulder and drew her near.

  “Um, would you mind if I, um, stayed with you tonight,” Scully quietly asked.

  Mulder tenderly looked into her eyes.

  “Stay.”

  They settled into bed, Mulder noting that Scully automatically chose what had always been “her” side of the bed when they were together.  Exhausted as they both were, sleep did not come easily for either of them.  Rolling over to face her, he saw Scully, awake, staring at the ceiling.

  “C’mere,” he whispered, extending his arm out to her.  Mulder was expecting her to roll to her side away from him, but instead of spooning, she turned towards him, scooting in closer against the warmth of his body.  He delicately traced a lock of hair away from her face and loosely wrapped his arms around her.  She smiled and closed her eyes.  Mulder brushed her nose with eskimo kisses.  They laid in that close embrace for several minutes.  Mulder was content with his Scully being there in that moment.  He’d almost completely drifted off to sleep when he felt the pillowy lips he would recognize anywhere pressed against his own.  He opened his eyes to find her looking at him with a mixture of sadness, pleading, and desire shining in her eyes, highlighted by the sliver of moonlight peeking through the curtains. 

  Seeing that he was awake, she traced her index finger lightly down his chest.  Mulder caught it with his own index finger, pulled her hand towards him and planted delicate kisses on her knuckles.

  That night, they made love for the first time in years.  It was careful, gentle, a product of both their history and their grief.  They drifted asleep, limbs and bodies intertwined as silent tears slipped down to their pillows.

  Mulder thought about that night as he watched Scully sleep.  He made no move to wake her.  The full realization of everything that happened had yet to sink in, but Mulder was bursting with pride for Scully.  That Smoking Bastard wanted to unleash Armageddon, and Scully shut that shit down within hours.

  He always knew that one day, Dana Scully would save the world.

 

\---

 

  Mulder received a call from Tad O’Malley a few days after being released from the hospital.  He wasn’t entirely sure of what Tad apparently discovered while re-watching his broadcast from the day of the virus, but if it was something unexplained, he was all in.

  Mulder pulled into the _Truth Squad_ parking lot and stretched once he was out of the car.  It was time to get to work.

  Tad O’Malley ushered Mulder into the control room of the studio, where numerous monitors were tuned to most major news networks, as well as a couple displaying content that appeared to be broadcast through more unofficial channels.

  Sitting in the operator’s seat at the control board, Mulder rolled over a chair as Tad was quickly reversing through a broadcast of himself appearing deathly ill.    He stopped and pressed play as he found the part he sought.

  “So, what am I looking at,” Mulder asked, “besides you after a four-day bender?”

  O’Malley threw him a quick side-eye.

  “Upon re-watching the broadcast of the night of the Spartan Virus, I noticed some interference in spots.”

  _Interference?  Aliens?_   Mulder’s first guess for everything slammed into his mind. 

  O’Malley cued up the part of the broadcast where small blocks of color briefly appeared on the screen, then immediately disappeared.

  Mulder looked at the screen, unconvinced.  “It doesn’t look like normal static because of the colors,” he said.  “Maybe digital bleed-through from another broadcast?”

  “I considered that, but then I saw this.  That’s why I called you here.”

  O’Malley input a specific time into the control panel, advancing the monitor to that time stamp.  The scattered color blocks were there, but several were joined together enough to make out the faces of two men; one late teens, the other maybe mid-twenties.  They held a sign.

 

**ANOTHER VERSION OF THE TRUTH**

  
  Mulder was instantly fascinated.  Who _were_ these people?

 “Sooo…  Did some kids half-ass hack your show?”  The mild jab covered for the fact that Mulder was still hung up on the sign’s message. 

  O’Malley sighed and wondered how to even begin to explain the truly odd part of all of this.

  “Yes and no, I think,” he began carefully.

  “Well, did they or didn’t they?  What gives, O’Malley?  What do you know?”

  “You know much about cameras, Mulder?  Digital ones,” questioned O’Malley.

  Mulder remembered his awkward attempt at catching a photo of the Were-monster a few weeks earlier.  “Not much,” he admitted.

  “Okay.  So every digital camera or video records what’s called EXIF data when a file is created.  It’s an instant thing, embedded into the digital file itself.  Most cameras and phones today have GPS abilities, so that’s captured in the EXIF data, too,” he explained.

  Mulder could instantly sense that there was more to this than just a lesson on digital media.

  “What did you find,” he asked.

  O’Malley looked at the ground, then met Mulder’s eyes.

  “I had my guys run this more than once, so I’d know if I was seeing what I thought I was seeing.”

  Impatient for O’Malley to quit with the story time and get to it, he pointedly urged, “Which was?”

  O’Malley continued, “It appeared to be a live broadcast in the DC area, at the same time as mine.  During the times that more of the broadcast came through, like with the sign, we were able to extract some of the EXIF data.”

  Mulder looked.  Waited.

  “The EXIF data we obtained timestamped the broadcast February 22nd.” 

  He paused.

  “February 22, 2021.”

  Mulder’s eyebrows shot up as he tried to remember everything he knew about the mechanics of time travel.  
   
  “2021?  So your broadcast was interrupted and combined with one from five years in the future,” Mulder said, trying to piece together the information in his mind.

  “That’s exactly what it appears to be,” Tad replied with his typical flat delivery.

  “Any idea who these people were?  What they wanted?  You said EXIF records GPS.  Where did the broadcast originate,” Mulder wanted to know.

  “No clue as to their identities, but the broadcast coordinates place them at a warehouse north of DC.”

  “Seems like they had a message to relay.  Think they’ll keep trying?  Could we put something out there indicating that we want to speak with them, maybe?”  Mulder was shooting off questions as rapidly as they appeared in his brain.  It was times like these when he really missed having the Gunmen around.  They’d probably have the situation totally figured out by now, with Frohike trying to hit on girls five years in the future.  How _were_ these guys going back in time via the internet, if that’s what was happening?

  “I’m not sure, but we could try,” O’Malley replied.

 

\---

Dana Scully didn’t feel like a hero, though she was certainly would have been lauded as one by the press and media, had she let them.  The virus was unleashed by the Cigarette Smoking Man, and once Mulder told her about it, she felt no need to advertise what she'd done.  She asked that her name not be used in any of the stories, so they just referred to her as the doctor from the Washington DC area who stumbled upon a vaccine that seemed to stop the outbreak of the as-yet-undisclosed illness that was affecting everyone in its wake. Good enough.  She’d had no say in alien DNA being introduced into her system so many years ago, but she was glad that it was at least useful once.  She was also grateful that she and Agent Einstein had access to the CRISPR/Cas9, allowing them to quickly edit her genetic sample so she could create the vaccine.  Mostly, she was ecstatic that Mulder didn’t die on her.  Again.

  Once Mulder was released from the hospital and life returned to their slightly off-kilter version of normal, Scully began to quietly research something she was not yet ready to discuss with anyone.  What had she seen in the light on the bridge?  It could not have been what it looked like, and the chip in her neck hadn’t blindly led her there; she was there to save Mulder.  This was something else.

  She started by looking through old X-Files and scouring the internet, looking for other reported sightings of a hand, like the hand of God, reaching down from the heavens.  Agent Miller only recalled a bright light; he hadn’t actually seen it.  As far as she knew, it was just her.

  The idea of the “Hand of God” itself dates back centuries, appearing in both Jewish and Christian artwork which can be traced to the Early Medieval period.  While interesting, the descriptions of _Manus Dei_ and the others did not mirror her experience on the bridge.  There was also a cloud formation known as the hand of God, but what would have seemed logical on any other day was not the explanation she sought.  Scully knew in her heart that she had not been looking at a cloud.

  Through the years, Scully bore witness to a handful of religious experiences that she was unable to rationally explain.  While she hadn’t regularly attended Mass, she was by no means a lapsed Catholic.  She did not experience religious rapture that night.  She _was_ fascinated by the hand when she saw it.  It overwhelmed her, and whatever it actually was, the only way Scully could accurately describe it was as if there was a presence surrounding her.

  She found it in an unsolved case from 2007.  Had the X-Files been open at the time, the case would have definitely fallen under that classification.  There were at least four reports of what appeared to be a blinding white, hand-shaped figure descending from the sky.  Some of the locations in the reports included Jamaica, Alberta, Honolulu, and… Washington D.C.  There were no weather events in the areas when the reports were made; no lightning or electrical storms.  Each person insisted that they saw a large white hand with long, spindly fingers descending from the heavens.


	2. Capital G

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happened to make the future need "fixing"? Answer: A lot.

_"They pushed a button and elected him to office, and, uh, he pushed a button and he dropped a bomb"  
Nine Inch Nails - "Capital G"_

 

2016 was an election year, and by mid-year, the country appeared to be gearing up for a battle no one ever saw coming. Results aside, it would be historic; an outspoken reality-TV businessman versus the wife of a former president, and the first woman to ever be a major party's candidate for the presidency. Each side appeared to stockpile mud, and the slinging was early, fast, and vicious.

   
The Democratic candidate drew fire over a private email server she'd maintained while on official duty; the FBI investigated the matter and concluded that, while she used bad judgment, she did not actually break any laws, so there was no cause to indict. This was the final roadblock; once hurdled, it was an obstacle-free short sprint to becoming the official Democratic nominee for the 2016 election.

   
The Republican situation faced some rather extreme issues itself. Early into the campaign, people laughed when they saw his name on the ballot. People likened him to a YouTube comments section come to life. He pledged to "Make America Great Again," but never really outlined a plan of action, or even what he meant by "great." As the primaries approached, he took to social media, where he was free to say what he pleased in 140 characters or less. The more he spoke, people came to the conclusion that the "great America" he wanted to return to was sometime in the era of the 1940s and 1950s. The opposition pointed out some issues with that mindset: the US was essentially whitewashed during that time period; segregation was still legal, racism was rampant, and women's rights were minimal at best. Racial tension and a widespread mistrust, if not outright hatred for police officers sparked a national conversation. It brought these issues to the forefront. The US appeared to be nearing a breaking point.

   
Last-minute scandals exploded like a bag of Jiffy Pop as the clock wound down towards the election. The FBI itself came under scrutiny due to the questionable timing of a statement from the director about the closed email investigation less than two weeks before election day. The Department of Justice was supposed to be a neutral entity, but it almost seemed politically motivated. Half the country seemed to think _that_ was more damning than the announcement that the opposing candidate was approaching a trial date for allegedly raping a child. Something had to give.

   
Amidst all the chaos, the congregation of a suburban Dallas church quietly set in motion their own plan of action.

 

The Church of Plano

 

The protest was the final straw. Located just 20 miles from Dallas, the 270,000 residents of Plano often considered themselves to be part of the whole. The affluent people of Plano were known for two things: they were extremely conservative and extremely religious.

   
They were also very persuasive.

   
As 2015 came to an end, the reality TV businessman made enough headway with voters, he essentially had the GOP nomination clinched. He enjoyed "stirring the pot" whenever an opportunity presented itself. One of his suggestions in late 2015 resulted in some rather spirited debate; he proposed to close the internet. Anticipating his suggestion would be challenged, his response was:

 

_"Somebody will say, 'Oh, freedom of speech, freedom of speech.' These are foolish people. We have a lot of foolish people."_

 

That attitude permeated everything he said. A textbook example of narcissism, he seemed to truly believe he could do no wrong. By the time the Republican National Convention kicked off, the candidate's wife copied almost word-for-word a speech given by the sitting First Lady. The candidate Tweeted an exact replica of the President's congratulatory post-speech tweet from the Democratic National Convention.

   
The general unease of the Republican party intensified. They had no idea how much worse it would actually get before the election; it would be months before the heavy scandals hit, which resulted in many prominent Republicans withdrawing their support outright. Their candidate almost appeared to be making a mockery of the political process, and his swarms of voters were frothing at the mouth for him to win.

   
The esteemed ladies of the Church of Plano took special notice of the candidate's comment about closing the internet. They fully supported the idea and made it their cause. Their focus was domestic. It was decided that they would attempt to have internet pornography classified as a public health crisis.

   
They named their group the SWAT (Serving, Working, and Advising Together) Team. Their first order of business was to draw up an official petition to classify internet porn as a public health crisis; a crisis so widespread, it was beyond the means of most households to prevent accidental consumption by children. The ultimate goal of the petition was to enforce strict content control over everything on the internet. They decided that the best way for their petition to strongly control the content of the internet to spread would be to circulate it.

   
On the internet.

   
The SWAT Team ladies wanted to ensure their petition was a success. They began targeting some of the stricter churches to join their cause. Their message carried far and wide after a few of America's megachurches pledged their support. The SWAT Team now had enough donations (though they were always accepting more!) to hire an ad agency to create some compelling imagery for the cause.

   
The campaign they designed was definitely memorable. A series of billboards were erected in major cities and small suburbs. They depicted a classroom setting with several fresh-faced students, all white, sat at desks equipped with laptops. One set of boards was from the perspective of an observer behind the children. A child's laptop screen could partially be seen; the image on it was mostly obscured, but enough was shown to reveal it as clearly pornographic. The teacher in front of the class was dressed in skin-tight skimpy clothing; she was seductively biting into an apple while perched on the corner of her desk in such a way to reveal an abundance of bare leg. Another approach had a boy/girl feature divided down the center. The kids used in the campaign were very young and very cute. Each had “When I Grow Up" next to their photos. Beneath that was a sheet of notebook paper, topped with "I Want:" in a child's scrawl, followed by a numbered list.

 

  * Girl's List: 
    1. Bleach my hair
    2. Breast implants!
    3. Bikini body



 

  * Boy's List: 
    1. Be dominant
    2. Be the boss
    3. Keep her in line (or else)



   
The billboards were jarring and very, very effective. The news media picked up the story, and one week later, the SWAT Team was featured on the _Today Show_.  
  
What people didn't bother to do, once the petition got enough signatures to be added to the ballot, was to actually read the _entire_ proposal. Stuck in the middle of a boring, typical passage was the clause that would change history. A new department dubbed the Morality Police would be created with the initial purpose of monitoring the internet. While technically set up to be a funded watchdog group, the wording of the clause allowed it to be much more widespread than just trying to crack down on internet pornography.  
  
  
It would monitor _everything_.  
 

Any and all activity performed on the internet would be recorded, tracked, tagged, and archived to a person's social security number. A web browser's stealth or incognito mode only wiped recent searches from one computer; the initial search was already logged and flagged, if necessary.  
  


The ladies of the SWAT Team were "pleased as punch," as they liked to say, about the complete overhaul the internet was more than likely going to receive. Voter support was huge for the bill. Their ad campaigns expanded to include children dressed to resemble porn stars. Textbooks spread on the child's bed resembled XXX magazines. The tagline of that particular campaign was "Kids love to learn -- What are they being taught?" Another spike of support immediately followed.  
  


The clause for the Morality Police didn't go unnoticed by _everyone_. Those who recognized the implications of what would happen if the bill passed, were trying to stop it, appealing to anyone who would listen, but managed only to hit a series of brick walls and dead ends. The imagery of the ad campaign was too strong, and once people snapped to a judgment, it was nearly impossible to change their minds. Groups of people began downloading en masse anything useful that could be blocked before the election.  
  


A small private security company recognized the potential fallout of the proposed massive loss of rights of the people. They naturally wanted to stop it, but realized their efforts might be better used in finding a way to combat or disable it after it was already in place. They operated under the mindset of worst case scenario. Though they were small, those associated with the group had a relatively high number of useful contacts. Hackers, physicists, even younger teenagers were consulted to gather opinions on a proposed "What would you do?" scenario. They received a huge variety of answers, but noticed that the most popular responses were several variations of a similar sentiment: It would be great if some sort of data scrambler was activated; something that could somehow bypass the constant monitoring that was being proposed. It was an interesting idea, in theory, but how would it work? Someone suggested the existing technology of Smart TVs, DVRs, and video games. Some video game systems had the ability to go back to the beginning of a scene, briefly, so the user could record themselves playing the game, then eventually post to social media. Similarly, a DVR allowed a viewer to rewind or pause live television. Could something be engineered to basically let internet activities exist in an interference loop, of which an outside observer (or official monitor) remain unaware? Theoretically, it seemed possible; not only did this theory hold massive potential, it was unintentionally a brilliant business model. Secure Broadcast Informatics was born. Once they worked out the kinks, patented the software, and had a name and process copyrighted, they could corner the volatile market of internet security with the release of Retrocause -- the world's first retrocausal internet security.

  
The in-joke around SBI was that they'd found a way to undo the "oh shit" moment when someone realized they'd made a serious error a split second too late to stop it. The top secret coding behind Retrocause enabled a security feature that actually prevented incidents a split second _before_ they happened. This technology came at a steep price -- their target market was companies especially vulnerable to attacks: e-commerce sites for huge retailers, brands, credit card companies, and the federal government.  
  


The government began using Retrocause in secret trials with the internet security division of the FBI, who had already been using their own form of malware for years. Retrocause successfully blocked attempts on SBI servers that were launched from the FBI. It was immediately ordered that SBI whitelist the FBI's existing malware program. All governmental computers ran Retrocause afterwards. Those who tried to breach the servers found themselves immediately identified and detained. Retrocause was set to launch publicly mid-2017, but a delay with federal regulations pushed it out until 2019.

   
The Research and Development division was already at work preparing a compliant version, should the Morality Police bill pass into law after the election. Since it was likely to pass, they prepared for the worst. They kept the information about the small backdoor they'd cloaked to themselves.

   
A small group of employees, along with a select few of their carefully vetted associates, found themselves debating longer-range effects of the retrocausal model. The Retrocause program allowed a brief window of access to a moment of pre-determined length before a qualifying interaction occurred, allowing Retrocause to effectively prevent the instigation of the event.

   
What would happen if the parameters of the window were changed? Could it go farther back, or were its limits absolute? This subgroup was well-aware of previous attempts -- and failures -- of attempted time travel. They also knew of a few instances where, under extremely controlled circumstances, the experiments worked. Late nights were spent arguing back and forth over procedures, known paradoxes, and the like. Forward movement, popularized by Albert Einstein, had been proven many times over. There were numerous barriers preventing successful travels backwards through time. This group believed that the initial success of Retrocause left ample room to expand. This became their sole focus. The small faction kept the initials of Secure Broadcast Informatics, as not to draw unwanted attention, but amongst themselves, the project was dubbed the _Solutions Backwards Initiative_.

   
Unbeknown to most, the primary figures behind the Solutions Backwards Initiative had been toying with this idea for years. They’d done something similar when George W. Bush was in office in 2007. It was a beta test of sorts, just to see how far their signal could reach.  

\-----

   
2007 was a volatile time for many. The US was finally nearing the end of George W. Bush's control of the White House. People were unemployed and facing a recession massive enough to draw comparisons to the Great Depression, and the Housing Bubble was gearing up to burst. It was a very uncertain time, and younger generations were facing issues direr than their parents could have ever imagined.

   
As had been the case throughout history, counter culture had a tendency to rise to prominence during times of crisis. Art is Resistance, a movement born in 2007, actively promoted taking a stand against the attitude of the citizens and the apathy of the government. It was a non-violent movement who chose to make politically charged statements, peacefully.

   
SBI had brief bouts of success when the Art is Resistance movement was able to pick up some of the transmissions. The process wasn’t refined so they’d gone back to design with a large set of hurdles to overcome; by the time their group expanded in the following years, many of the early issues had since been resolved.

\---   
  


FEBRUARY 2021  
_Washington, DC_  
  


“You think we’re actually making any headway with this?” asked Dani Sullivan as she walked through the side door of a deserted warehouse and into the headquarters of the Solutions Backwards Initiative. Glancing around the room, she took note of the occupants. Professor Matthew Garrett, from the MIT Physics Department was working out a problem on a white board. The hackers, Angel and Envy, were kicked back in chairs, working on laptops.

   
Angel glanced up at Dani. “Dunno, but it’s possible we’ve made a bit of progress. We pinged an IP that’s been searching for ours. Not one of the Bureau’s, either. Old school, IPv4 style. It’s the same one we were trying to bash the other night.”

   
Dani smiled. “Well, that could have some potential. When are we trying again? Need I remind you we have a deadline?”

   
Angel replied, “Yeah, no problem. Envy and I were going to go ahead and try again tonight. You in?”

   
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

   
Later that night, Dani, Envy, and Angel met at their broadcast location, hoping they’d have a bit more success in reaching someone who could understand their message.

   
As always, proper security measures absolutely had to be taken, or the results could be devastating. While each member of the SBI were smart, strong-willed people, they didn’t stand a chance against the suits in charge of the Bureau of Morality and their zero tolerance policy for anything even remotely considered to be subversive. Any fuckups would lead them straight to a one-way ticket to Ogram, and that thought was decidedly unpleasant.

   
It was bullshit, really, that all of this came to be, but unless things changed, it was the reality of life. All internet activity was monitored by the Bureau, so in order to cloak themselves, they had to make sure Retrocause was both running and correctly configured.

   
It’s amazing that Retrocause, or at least, the basic logistics of it didn’t happen years before it did. Or, maybe it did, and it was just kept cloaked? That would almost be funny. Build in some security features to what was essentially a DVR and think of the _true_ possibilities of the internet. What if someone had the ability to go back to right before something bad happened and just… stop it? That nasty virus doesn’t hit the work server; that DDOS was _just_ missed. SBI assumed people would pay lot of money to go back in time and fix a fuckup; especially those who had a lot to lose. They were absolutely correct -- companies _were_ willing to pay a lot of money. Retrocause wasn’t some hacker secret; it became a legit product turning a very healthy profit.

   
In 2019, a high-tech internet security firm publicly launched in Washington DC. Secure Broadcast Informatics specialized in internet security for some of the wealthiest corporations in the country. Once Retrocause was introduced, their demand skyrocketed. Corporations who had previously suffered massive data breaches lined up to sign up. They regularly employed hackers to try and beat their system. The only two who even came close to breaching Retrocause were Angel and Envy (fresh out of the Judson Ogram Correctional Facility for his “NakedVamp” run-in with the Bureau of Morality).

   
The fact that the hackers even came close to a breach attracted the attention of a small special project team within Secure Broadcast Informatics. They’d been working on a slightly different version of Retrocause. This one allowed users to go much further back in time than the standard release. It also had a feature that allowed users to cloak their internet use in a closed time loop, allowing users to access the internet the way it was before the Bureau of Morality controlled everything and monitored all interactions.

   
Secure Broadcast Informatics eventually won a few choice government contracts. Programmers of the alternate version were put in place for monitoring purposes. This was how some highly classified information about a major threat to the United States was “accidentally” uncovered. The SBI team knew better than to breathe a word of it to anyone outside of their tiny subgroup. They’d binge-watched enough reruns of _24_ to know what happened when someone pissed off the government.

   
A meeting was called between the SBI heads to brief them on the looming threat. Once everyone was up to speed, it was decided that their mission to push the boundaries of Retrocause was both valid and justified. They were all old enough to remember how things were _before_ the Bureau, before the new laws. That was bad enough, but knowing how much worse it was going to get if the new plan was put to action? _Terrorism_ wasn’t a large enough word for it. It would likely be the beginning of the end.

   
It was decided that the only way to fix the future was to have powerful allies from the past.

 

*         *         * 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mulder and Scully took a breather during this chapter. Don't worry, they'll be back in a big way.
> 
> Also, the Freedom of Speech quote was real, as was his idea to lock down the internet. Unfortunately.


End file.
